Editorial: Limit police chases to critical cases

Sep. 25, 2013

Police need to limit high-speed pursuits to known violent crimes and an immediate threat to the public. Many chases for lesser crimes result in injury and even death, such as the crash in Warren County early Tuesday (not shown). / Enquirer file

One person is dead and another in critical condition after a police chase that didn’t have to happen.

Just after midnight Monday, along two-lane Ohio 122 in Warren County, Clearcreek Township police gave chase when a speeding driver failed to stop for the officer’s lights and siren.

That, of course, was a mistake. But did it warrant a police pursuit at speeds of more than 100 mph along a narrow road at night? It didn’t.

The initial offense that caught the police attention was speeding. Speeding is against the law because it’s unsafe to the drivers, passengers and other motorists and bystanders. So why ramp up the speed even more and get two cars flying in a hot pursuit? That only doubles the danger to everyone involved and to innocent motorists and others.

Indeed, the driver lost control of his car after running over Stop Sticks, the car veered off the road and into a utility pole. The driver, 28-year-old Morgan Flener, was killed. His passenger, a 20-year-old woman, suffered life-threatening injuries.

The end result, death and serious injury, wasn’t warranted by the crime of speeding. Certainly, the driver should not have been speeding in the first place and should have stopped when ordered to by police. But escalating the situation only worsened it and turned it into tragedy.

Police pursuits are often deadly. A 2010 FBI report found that one person dies, on average, every day from a police pursuit. Many of those killed or injured – 42 percent – are innocent third parties.

There is a better, safer way. It’s a policy that permits pursuits only for known violent crimes and an immediate threat to the public. The International Association of Chiefs of Police has adopted a model pursuit policy that calls for the officer on the scene to give chase only if “the immediate danger to the officer and the public created by the pursuit is less than the immediate or potential danger to the public should the suspect remain at large.”

Under this policy, a police chase for speeding or running a stoplight wouldn’t be permitted.

One national expert in police policies says chases should be undertaken only when a violent crime has been committed against someone and the person fleeing has shown a willingness to harm someone in the community. That’s a pretty high bar.

Easing off a chase takes the pressure out of the situation and usually means the suspect will slow down. It doesn’t mean the suspect is allowed to go free. The police network can be activated through a search for a license plate number, description of the vehicle, its location and direction of travel and surveillance cameras. All that information can be reported to supervisors, dispatchers and other police agencies to arrest the suspects, alive and uninjured, at another time.

Police agencies may argue that refusing to chase those who don’t stop will encourage others to ignore police orders. But the FBI report found that refraining from hot pursuit or ending the chase results in “no significant increase in the number of suspects who would flee.” Most people are law-abiding citizens who will stop when ordered to by police flashing lights and sirens.

Police chases can be deadly. Police agencies should review their policies with the intent of ending the mayhem that can come from ill-advised high-speed pursuits. We have called for this before. And, unfortunately, we’ll likely call for it again. Let’s really make change this time. ⬛